Zippy, you should be careful about insulting the Moderator of the forum...

I am afraid the days of physical media are numbered.

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Originally Posted by RandomRob

Consoles are based on manufacturing model thats almost 30 years out of date. ie- selling discs. It's wasteful and overpriced. And used digital property can't be resold, which is what publishers want.

Sure, and I think we're in broad agreement. Eventually this model will work for consoles, especially as we gain bandwidth and move away from download limits (I assume this will happen). PC Gamers, being the most technologically advanced, are possibly the most likely to already have this model in place.

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As for PC price.. spend double what you'd pay for a new system and it's peripherals, and split the savings on the games.

Popular launch titles of last generation like Just Cause 2 for ps3 and Xbox 360 still run $20 for a game disc, but you can regularly buy them on Steam for 2.50$

I think PCs vs consoles has the same flaw in it as the american vs japanese car argument. Because it's been shown that japanese cars are better made, people spend more on them for maintenance, and vice versa- they run their american cars into the ground because they just expect to get rid of them after a few years. So the perception perpetuates the model. Same with consoles. You keep or sell the old one and buy a new one and a new library of games, and forget the money you lose. But if you buy a big PC with good memory and power, you just have to replace the CPU and GPU every few years. It's less money. And your library is in cyberspace.

Sure, but convenience, no? It may make sense long-term but there are obstacles to the PC approach.

I can't currently walk into a store and buy a PC off the shelf that can play the latest games without paying an extortionate price. This may change.

I could buy a cheap gaming PC, but I'd have to spec it myself. Who wants to do that?

The Steam Box or a cheap alternative may be launched. Will it be easy to use? Will an advertising campaign be able to target the console demographic?

Will it sound like I have a hairdryer sitting beside my TV? Because that is a dealbreaker.

With the new console processing power, will the PC arms race begin again? In which case a PC box could fall prey to that and be redundant again.

Do I want to play Vampire The Masquerade on my PC Box sitting on my couch? Sure, I probably do....but how many of the target demographic do?

I love the idea of the Bro Gamer, who plays only sports games. A lot of the guys in my Madden league play only sports games, with a bit of Assassin's Creed sprinkled in (no CoD, funnily enough). But then they are Euro guys playing an American sports game, they are probably maniacs.

I can't see the PS4 being less than 399 in each currency, so a PC box could compete price wise....maybe. It will really be fascinating to see how it will compete overall. We're in for an interesting year, I think.